Tuesday Open Thread

I'm listening to...
I'm still certain that what motivates me
Is more rewarding than any piece of paper could be -- Dennis Lyxzén

The Atlantic did an interview with Barack Obama in this months publication & titled it "Obama on Zionism and Hamas . Obama is quoted as having said:

"the idea of a secure Jewish state is a fundamentally just idea, and a necessary idea, given not only world history but the active existence of anti-Semitism, the potential vulnerability that the Jewish people could still experience...He assailed Hamas as a terrorist organization and said the United States "should not be dealing with them until they recognize Israel, renounce terrorism, and abide by previous agreements....Israel and the Palestinians have tough issues to work out to get to the goal of two states living side by side in peace and security." When asked if Israel besmirches the United States' reputation, Obama said "No, no, no." Then he said: "But what I think is that this constant wound, that this constant sore, does infect all of our foreign policy. The lack of a resolution to this problem provides an excuse for anti-American militant jihadists to engage in inexcusable actions, and so we have a national-security interest in solving this, and I also believe that Israel has a security interest in solving this because I believe that the status quo is unsustainable. I am absolutely convinced of that ... I want to solve the problem..."

ABC News reports that John Boehner twisted this statement and said:

"Israel is a critical American ally and a beacon of democracy in the Middle East, not a ‘constant sore’ as Barack Obama claims," Boehner said. "Obama’s latest remark, and his commitment to ‘opening a dialogue’ with sponsors of terrorism..."

I really don't appreciate manufactured controversy. It's abundantly clear from the Atlantic piece that Obama said nothing that Boehner said, in fact he said the opposite of what Boehner says he said. Yet here we have the Minority Leader making things up and telling the MSM (which dutifully paraded these lies to Americans) that Obama hates Americans and Obama can't be trusted by the Jews of this world. Other lesser figures have gone on to parrot Boehners statements to I guess reinforce the bullshit lies.

Why do these people think we are idiots? In this day and age of internet communications, how is it that they think they can pull the wool over Americans eyes so?

I'm going to be watching the repercussions of this one today just to see how many Malkin/Rush/O'Liely's try to run with this blatant lie.

link

Doyle says "poker players have to support Obama."  I agree.  McCain has been strengthening ties to the "church lady" wing of the Republican Party, and that can be nothing but bad news for poker players and their freedoms. 

a story from the MSM about a Mayor being ousted and it never mentions his Democrat party affiliation even once. Hmmmm.

Republican Maverick at Large
-4:Strongly Disagree; 0:Meh; +4:Strongly Agree

House Democrats begin impeachment process for Dann

Democrats in the Ohio House of Representatives have filed to impeach Attorney General Marc Dann.

The House Democratic Caucus on Tuesday filed nine articles of impeachment against Dann, a Democrat. Many of the articles point to alleged instances of neglect that legislators contend occurred in Dann's sworn testimony during an independent investigation into sexual harassment allegations involving a former staffer and other statements Ohio's top lawyer has made.

[...]

Enough said.

Republican Maverick at Large
-4:Strongly Disagree; 0:Meh; +4:Strongly Agree

Here's a Michelle Malkin piece you Democrats might actually like:

The stupid party strikes again “The Change You Deserve”

[...]

Conservatives have spent the entire campaign season eviscerating Democrat candidates who’ve tattooed themselves with the empty “change” slogan. So what do the brain-dead strategists and p.r. market wizards of the GOP go and do?

Wrap themselves in “change.”

[...]

The crack research staff at GOP HQ somehow missed that “Change You Deserve” is the marketing slogan for Effexor, an anti-depressant.

Brilliant.

Republican Maverick at Large
-4:Strongly Disagree; 0:Meh; +4:Strongly Agree

I wanted to make sure to highlight it here ...

Behold the Power of Irrelevance
Mission accomplished.

Irrelevance is sweet. Sweetest, perhaps — ironically — for John McCain.

It was only a few months ago that California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger declared talk-radio king Rush Limbaugh “irrelevant.”

David Brooks announced that “Limbaugh, Grover Norquist and James Dobson have influence, but they are not arbiters of conservative doctrine.”

[...]

But on Tuesday, in the Indiana and North Carolina primaries, two things happened which should have Ahnuld, Brooks, the Washington PostThe Rush Limbaugh Show today and for the rest of the 2008 election: newsroom, and the McCain campaign — for the senator’s sake — tuning into

First: Limbaugh’s “Operation Chaos ” — which has encouraged Republicans to vote for Clinton in open-primary states — may have reached its zenith.

[...]

The beginning of the end for the woman who would be the first Madam President, coming as late as it did — the Pennsylvania primary is not supposed to be a pivotal event! — can almost certainly be chalked up to the hardly irrelevant Operation Chaos. No less than the Obama campaign acknowledged Limbaugh’s role . OpChaos was about divide and conquer. Create chaos on the Left. Weaken the Democratic nominee.

And so it has.

At
the end of it all — which is about where we are now — it worked: The protracted Democratic battle helped welcome Jeremiah Wright back to the podium. Even Obama’s relationship with terrorist Bill Ayers got a little more airtime (with more to come). There were actual debates. The bloom came off the Barackstar rose. Obama has been wounded in a way that McCain would never have done and that his fans in the media would probably not have permitted if Hillary hadn't stayed in the race

[...]

There was a second important component to Tuesday’s primaries: In North Carolina, 26 percent of Republicans voted against John McCain; 22 percent voted against him in Indiana. Behold the power of talk radio, John McCain, which could help deliver a Republican victory this year, in spite of party perils and the GOP candidate’s frequent alienation from his base.

As a conservative who is skeptical of the Arizona senator — and who was reminded that McCain cannot always be relied on during the senator’s speech on judges at Wake Forest University — said to me this morning: It’s possible that “OpChaos has provided the only plausible rationale for voting Republican this year.” And as a legitimate arbiter or at least leading interpreter of conservative doctrine, Limbaugh sleeps at night knowing he’s not being a party guy. He’s trying to save the Republican party from itself, while standing athwart those who would allow it to be reshaped in the image of John McCain.

Not bad for a has been, eh?

Obama Camp Credits ‘Operation Chaos’ for Clinton Lead in Indiana

Barack Obama’s campaign issued an e-mail on Tuesday night that appeared to relegate Hillary Clinton’s lead in Indiana to efforts by Rush Limbaugh to wreak havoc in the Democratic presidential primary contest.

In an e-mail entitled “The Limbaugh Effect in Indiana = 7 percent,” Obama campaign spokesman Bill Burton wrote: “According to the latest exit polling data, 17 percent of voters in the Indiana primary today said they would vote for John McCain in a Clinton/McCain match-up. Forty-one percent of that number is constituted by people who voted Clinton in the primary but also indicated they will vote for McCain in the general election. That comes out to just under 7 percent of the primary electorate the number that may be attributed to a Limbaugh Effect.”

“The Limbaugh Effect” referred to “Operation Chaos,” which the conservative radio talk show host launched early in the primary season to create “balance” in the 2008 primary contest after he said liberal influences helped John McCain emerge as the presumptive Republican presidential nominee.

Wow, 7 percent in Indiana. Not bad for someone who is supposedly irrelevant,eh?

Obama Camp Urges Superdelegates: “Bring This to a Close”

[Senator John] Kerry [who served in Vietnam] said that it is the responsibility of the superdelegates to ensure that the Democratic Party will be unified at the convention in August, and suggested that Obama could have won the Indiana primary last night if it was not for the Republicans. “I think if it hadn’t been for Republicans taking Democratic ballots he likely would have won in Indiana too,” Kerry said. “Rush Limbaugh was tampering with the primary and the GOP has clearly declared that they want Hillary Clinton as a candidate.”

Direct from the last election's loser, Rush most likely tilted the Indiana primary to Clinton.

Did Rush help Hillary in Indiana?

Obama chief strategist David Axelrod, speaking to reporters on Obama’s plane on the way to Chicago from his rally on Tuesday night in North Carolina, said he saw a Rush factor at play in Clinton’s win.

He said Clinton ought to “call a press conference and thank Rush Limbaugh for the victory.” He said the margin of victory for Clinton was so narrow, there is a good chance Limbaugh might have tipped the scales for her.

“Eleven percent of the total electorate were Republicans. She got 52 percent of those. A large percentage of them said they would favor McCain in a race against Clinton.”

Republican Maverick at Large
-4:Strongly Disagree; 0:Meh; +4:Strongly Agree